A Stranger in his Homeland

Setting: Outside the family tipi.

Son: Hello? Shakes tipi a bit. Ate?

Pause before tipi door opens.

Father: Son? What the hell happened to you?

Son: What? Oh, you mean my...

Father: Your everything!

Father grabs sons head. Pulls hair out from either side.

Father: What is this? You’re bald.

Son: Ouch!

Father: Is that what you said when they cut all of this off? Mocking son. “Ouch!”? “Ouch” is no defense, son. Have I taught you nothing? You are Lakota. You defend yourself. You defend your people.

Son: Father let me explain…

Father: Your hair is not long…yet you are not mourning …your hair is short. Where is the logic?

Son: The educators cut it when I arrived.

Father: Oh my son, you know your hair stays long. You know better. Ciksi , we know
better.

Son: Quietly. I know, Ate.

Father sits on a nearby log with his hands covering his face.

Father: Still with his head down. Your mother and I thought we were doing you a favor. We thought these people would provide you with education...with skills.

Son: Oh, but they did! I can read, I can write, I understand math. I learned to work with steel and iron.

Father: What about hunting? Fishing?

Son: No…no, we did not hunt or fish.

Father: You’ve become one of them.

Son: I am not one of them…Sure, I have just adopted their ways…the proper way.

Father: Proper? Look at you, look at your face, your feet!

Father looks at Son’s tennis shoes in replace of his moccasins.

Son: I wear these shoes for games…our teachers took away our moccasins straight
away…after they cut our h--.

Father: Interrupting. Games? What games?

Son: Basketball.

Father: A waste. A waste of time!

Son: Somewhat ashamed. I’m really quite good.

Father: Is that what these filthy white people have convinced you?

Son: No, it is the truth. I’m good and I’ve never played basketball. It is an American sport.

Father: Jumps to his feet. American?! Who are you calling American? We are
Americans, son, not that dirty Richard Pratt who forced these poor Natives into
his bigoted scheme.

Son: At school, we learned the truth about the Lakota culture.

Father: The truth?

Son: Our…religion, our language, our clothing…we are unsophisticated in comparison.

Father: Unsophisticated? Son, our people inhabited this territory long before the European Americans.

Son: Yes. And Father, and it seems we have been living uncivilized since we arrived.

Father: We defined this land. These people have tried to push our Native culture further away from our homeland for years. But son, when we become part of the Sioux tribe, we did not lose our pride. You mustn’t let these so-called “Americans” assimilate you. They have turned you into a stranger. You are running away from your Lakota values without realizing. You may return to this home when you’ve decided to change your ways. Turns away from Son and enters Tipi.

http://www.crystalinks.com/sioux.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lakota_people
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Henry_Pratt
http://language.nativeweb.org/Lakota_translation.htm
http://www.blackfives.com/blog_pics/carlisle.jpg
http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/D?curt:5:./temp/~ammem_rVce::